The Lucent Dossier Experience is an all-encompassing adventure of music, art, and avant garde performance. Lucent Dossier provides a wonderland of creativity and imagination for the audience, as it integrates the artistic novelties of aerial acrobatics, contortion, and belly dance into an inspiring musical storyline.

Dream Rockwell is a true visionary, and it shows on her resume, as she is the director of the Lucent Dossier Experience, co-founder of premier transformational festival, Lightning in a Bottle, and a fearless public speaker.

I watched the Lucent Dossier Experience and heard Dream Rockwell’s ‘Riskier Conversations’ talk at Lightning in a Bottle’sTemple of Consciousness last month. Dream’s inspiring story and beautiful perspectives moved me to tears; therefore, I was completely stoked when she agreed to let me pick her brain. We talked about The Lucent Dossier Experience’s current Light of the World Tour, Lightning in a Bottle Festival, and removing the stigma of sexual abuse from society. Dream’s eloquentness and honesty left me exponentially inspired.

Sensible Reason: How would you describe the Lucent Dossier Experience in one sentence to someone who is completely out of the loop?

Dream Rockwell: Lucent Dossier is a futuristic circus, a permission slip for people to be more of who they really are: weirder, wilder, more free, more sensual, more expressed, and more real.

SR: It’s been said that art is a reflection of man and his time. What would you say the Lucent Dossier Experience reflects of our time?

Dream: I think Lucent reflects that we’re ready to go deeper; we’re ready to open up and become more truthful with each other. [We’re ready to] free ourselves from all the rules and regulations we’ve inherited from those who came before us that don’t serve us. I think we as society are so thirsty for that type of freedom and connection.

SR: The Lucent Dossier Experience celebrated their 10th year anniversary at Coachella this year. What are some of the biggest challenges you guys have overcome in the last 10 years?

Dream: In truth, this was our 9th year, and The Do LaB’s 10th. The biggest challenge has always been to summon up the enormous life force that it takes to put on such intricate shows, sometimes 3 or 4 times a day [as we did] back in the early years, in the heat of day and cold of night in the desert. It has always been an incredible outpouring of energy. This year moving to the Gobi stage and doing only two shows all weekend, one in The Do LaB area and the other on the Gobi, was still a challenging feat, but much easier.

SR: This current tour show is set to the eastern-ceremonial, deep bass live music from your upcoming album Light of the World. When will that album be released?

Dream: We hope to celebrate the release at the Hard Rock in Vegas on July 25th and Club Nokia in LA on July 26th. We are just putting on the final touches now.

SR: What are you looking forward to most about this current “Light of the World” tour that kicked off last week at Lightning in a Bottle?

Dream: Getting out and meeting the people across America. We have had Internet fans who have never seen us live, [they have] just [seen] videos and pix. We’re excited to go out and meet them all. The opportunity to play to smaller audiences again is also very appealing. We love the huge crowds; it’s very charging, electrifying really, but the smaller crowds are so intimate and personal. We really get into close personal eye-to-eye contact.

SR: In addition to performing with (and directing) Lucent Dossier at Lightning in a Bottle, you are also a co-founder of the festival. What was your original inspiration for creating LiB?

Dream: The original inspiration was to create a safe space for people to come and play and explore themselves, [in order to] find their true essence…to inspire people to be more free, to dance, and to connect deeply with one another. To give people a reason to speak to their neighbor, even if just to lean over and say, “Wow, that was cool.” I have always felt that we as humans spend a good lot of our lives feeling starved for deep intimate connection. At LIB you can have that with a total stranger in the middle of a dance floor: a moment of understanding, sharing a feeling without expectation, or attachment or judgment. You might never see each other again, but the energy exchange and the feeling of acceptance and closeness with a total stranger leaves us rejuvenated and charged. That’s how humans are supposed to respond to each other, with unconditional love and understanding.

SR: What are your main Lightning in a Bottle projects and responsibilities?

Dream: In the beginning I was involved in every little aspect of the festival, from PR to door procedures to talent booking to the developing and building the interactive environments to the greening of the festival…and on and on. It was pretty intense back in those days. These days we have amazing department heads handling most of these areas. My focus is now the Temple of Consciousness and all that transpires within it. This includes yoga, speakers, workshops, interactive areas, and music. As I’ve been able to focus on the Temple, the area has grown, and I think that sets LIB apart from other festivals. It’s a pretty unique experience to be able to dance and party, and also nurture and take care of ourselves, to explore powerful learning and transformative opportunities, giggle and laugh at weird and wonderful performances all in the same place and at same time. To me, that’s life perfection. As one little boy said at LIB last year, “I wish the whole world could be like LIB.” I guess I can say me too!

SR: How do you have enough hours in the day to direct the Lucent Dossier experience, coordinate Lightning in a Bottle and the Temple of Consciousness, and manage all of the projects in between?

Dream: I don’t. I could use another 4 to 6 hours every day! I’m always asking for more hours in the day. I end up giving up my personal life. It’s hard, but worth it.

SR: I caught most of ‘Riskier Conversations’ at Lighting in a Bottle’s Temple of Consciousness this year, and was left very moved by your story and perspectives. You shared with the audience that you were sexually abused as a child, and overcoming that is now the strength that you walk in. Why do you think it is such a taboo in our society to talk about sexual abuse when it is such a common problem?

Dream: It’s taboo because of the shame/blame game; we fear we’ll be cast out. It’s taboo because we’re afraid we won’t be loved if people know. It’s taboo because we’ve seen people persecuted for it; we’ve seen what happens when someone comes forth and is called a liar. It’s a very tricky subject. I plan to keep discussing it in open forum in hopes that it will free others. There is nothing more toxic then ‘dirty secrets’. I believe we must release these things and free ourselves. It’s amazing how comforting it is to know we’re not alone. I think when people see what I have come through and that I’m happy and adjusted and expressed and that I stand now in my own power, they will know that they too can have this for themselves. My life isn’t perfect, I still endure lots of intense moments, but I’m in forward motion and my perspective is broad enough for me to feel O.K., even blessed for all I have endured. And I did endure it: even though I feel it is my super power now, it’s only my super power because I endured.

SR: In what ways can we, as a society, work toward removing the stigma of sexual abuse and encourage victims to openly talk about the problem in an effort to eliminate it?

Dream: I think we need to become less judgmental about everything. I think people feel free to talk openly about all sorts of things with me, because I’m open. I work very diligently, daily, to release judgment from my life. It’s such a part of our society to judge others, and then we judge ourselves. It causes so much grief and misunderstanding, because most of our judgment is shallow and incorrect. I hope one day to live in a world where there is freedom of expression and that we except each other as we are. Maybe from that place there will be no space for abuse, of any kind.

SR: Is there anything else you would like to add about Lucent, yourself, or other projects for your readers?

Dream: Thank you for this moment in time. We are in this thing together, this life on earth thing; we have to make choices together that serve the greater whole. If we can be more open and accepting of our differences, I think we’ll all live a happier life. Together we rise.

Special thanks to Dream Rockwell for graciously answering our questions with such eloquent transparency. If you feel as inspired by her words, or as intrigued by the The Lucent Dossier Experience as we were, make sure to catch them at one of these shows on their current Light of the World Tour.

Transformational festivals are a hot-topic of discussion right now due to their reputation of social activism, global change and conscious living; Lightning in a Bottle (LiB) sets the transformational festival ...